Do the masks ever progress beyond 4 evolution points, or do you just get more different ones? That'd be my glaring question regarding effectiveness-- I'd worry about replacing an ability that advances in raw power as you level with one that gains flexibility but no power.

I go up to 6 evolution points per mask at 10, and 8 at 20. At 7, I get to have one evolution point active at all times, even when not in rage, and which evolution it is can be changed. At 15, I get 2 active at all times. I do have a bit less raw power than a Barbarian, true, but in this case the flexibility is good enough to be worth it.

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On relevancy, I certainly wouldn't bother with Spring Attack/Vital Strike. The point of Pounce is to avoid the need for things like that.

If I don't take those three feats, where should I reinvest them?

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The two options that immediately jump out to deal with the standard charge-and-pounce tactics, to me, are overrunning and flying. Overrunning breaks mook walls and can add up to a fair bit of damage, flying avoids all those irritating terrain issues. The former, you have two rage powers (Overrunning Advance/Overrunning Onslaught) and a handful of feats (Improved/Greater Overrun, Spiked Destroyer is amusing). The latter, you have a three rage power chain that culminates in flight with the new Elemental Blood powers. Unfortunately, Lesser Elemental Blood is a minor damage boost and Elemental Blood is pretty mediocre; you'd be looking at Electric Resistance 10. Greater Elemental Blood (Air) gives you a fly speed of 60 though. If you have an easy way of flying, probably not worthwhile... but if not, that could be a nice way to ensure your pouncing fun doesn't get interrupted. I do see that one of your Masks has a flight option, but personally I'd think you'd rather use your Masks to boost your offensive prowess, since this is still more-or-less a rage. That kind of depends on your GM and whether or not they like to shut down charge lanes often.

I think I did take Improved Overrun already. Can I even take a blood power? I thought those were Bloodrager only.

I am allowed to create my own masks, so I could take my Mask of Mists, drop the Shadow Form evolution, take a different 2 point evolution like +2 Str or natural armor, and have a mask that enhances my combat ability and lets me fly. Then, I'd be capable of both overrunning and flying. The one thing is that I can't change masks during a rage, so I have to decide if I need to fly when I first activate the ability.

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I do have to admit, I'm not a fan of Reckless Abandon. Your goal involves getting in their face as fast as possible, tanking your defenses to do that (even if you are more flexible than the standard Barbarian in that regard) seems like a dangerous call.

I found out about the Masquerade Reveler, and I just had to pick it up. It is one of the best things to ever happen to the Barbarian class.

It's not on the PFSRD, so for those who aren't familiar, it's a Barbarian who does not get Str, Con, and Will bonuses during rage, instead gaining masks. A mask has 4 evolution points that the Masquerade Reveler gets to select, and you get another mask each level. When raging, you choose one mask, and get those evolutions for the duration of the rage. It is awesome, and glorious, and I've never seen any complaints about it being unbalanced. I rolled up a 5th level one, which I present here. I don't need help optimizing the masks, but I would appreciate opinions as to whether she looks useful in combat as she is right now. I also need help choosing what feats to get beyond level 5, and what equipment and rage powers (I get rage powers like a normal Barbarian). I'm trying to create a speed based character and really want pounce (if I do it right, at level 11 I can charge 160 feet while under the effect of blur and full attack), but I need to be relevant in combat after than charge, and my understanding is that Spring Attack/Vital Strike characters are hard to do properly.

I'm not really sure what I sought to accomplish besides venting my anger and bad feelings and having people respond to the fact that I have issues. It was pretty stupid and pathetic, really. Things like that erode trust within the community (what's really pathetic is that Gary Teter had to point that out to me for me to notice just how badly I messed up), and I chose both the wrong place and wrong methods to deal with my issues.

Right.

I think you need to go talk to somebody IRL, because some of the stuff you said and did, and continue to say and do throws up a lot of warning signs.
So, that's pretty much the extent of what I have to say to you, because it's actually the only thing I have to say of you that is of any value.

If you think that was bad, you'd have been shocked speechless if you'd seen me as a teenager. I was much, much, much worse. I do appreciate your concern and advice, but I'll be okay. I have problems, and I make mistakes more often than I'd like, but I'm a lot better than I used to be, and I can keep on getting better.

Paladins can smite anything? That's an interesting change, but its hard not to criticize something that went from a situational power (albeit one that comes up often enough to be relevant) to an every enemy power.

Are you lowering the power level of the ability to compensate, or increasing the power of similar abilities (Favoured Enemy comes to mind) to compensate in a different way?

No. I'm leaving smite as is other than that it can target anything. In my campaigns, Paladins generally don't end up fighting anything they can't smite, so saying that they can smite anything now doesn't change balance much. They could do that unofficially already.

Also, with the way I handle Paladins falling and the fact that it's possible to play a character that has half Paladin features and half Antipaladin features and with the lack of alignment, it's easiest to simply let them smite whatever they are fighting.

Paladins can smite anything? That's an interesting change, but its hard not to criticize something that went from a situational power (albeit one that comes up often enough to be relevant) to an every enemy power.

Are you lowering the power level of the ability to compensate, or increasing the power of similar abilities (Favoured Enemy comes to mind) to compensate in a different way?

No. I'm leaving smite as is other than that it can target anything. In my campaigns, Paladins generally don't end up fighting anything they can't smite, so saying that they can smite anything now doesn't change balance much. They could do that unofficially already.

As for other homebrew/3PP, I allow Psionics Unleashed, as it's a wonderfully balanced book and I would like to have Psionics in my campaign setting, I allow Grit and Gunslingers because the Fusilier is awesome, and I allow the Ardwright because I want an Artificer.

If you are looking at creating some interesting archetypes inspired by the myriad of different mythologies, then I think that could work really well. If you are going for a stereotypical "Indian" archetype that's going to faceplant rather badly.

Don't worry. I'm not attempting a general "Indian" archetype. For the most part, I'm using existing classes and archetypes for NPC natives and having my players do the same for PC natives, I'm just asking you guys if there are any concepts you can think up that could use their own archetype instead of an existing one.

I understand that American Indian is a very broad term, and am accounting for it culturewise. However, archetype wise, I'm covering fighting styles of the whole continent, most of which are already represented by existing archetypes. I'm just looking for any holes, like a dedicated archer cavalier. Magic wise, divine magic is important, arcane magic is not (In this world, aside from some witchcraft traditions, arcane magic is a very new thing, so there really aren't any native traditions, or colonist traditions, for that matter. Arcane magic is more of a make it up as you go along thing.). Guns are not important, as I am not using them in this campaign setting. It's a style choice. I want medieval fantasy, I just want to move things to an area not often covered.

As for areas, I'm doing countries one by one, so while right now I'm working on researching Canadian and New England tribes for the Kingdom of Cromora, later on I'll be working with Aztecs, Maya, the Iroquois tribes, the Sioux tribes, and so on. I'd like to get all the archetypes handled now, so that later I just have to worry about culture.

Uzi's are nice, but I don't feel like shelling out thousands upon thousands of dollars for the necessary legal procedures and gun itself in order to get a fully automatic version, and a semi automatic version just isn't something I'd be interested in. I'd rather get some sweet older guns that are much easier to obtain legally. Plus, I may try to get into Canada, Australia, New Zealand, Ireland, or Britain, in which case I'd rather hold off on gun purchases and wait until I can comply with the stricter local laws in those countries.

Paizo is a business. As a business, there are certain things Paizo does not want going on in it's messageboards. It is a matter of image. The thread degenerated into the things Paizo does not want, therefore it got locked. This is completely reasonable. If Paizo doesn't want something going on, that is their prerogative. I can see how a religious battle is something Paizo would rather not have.

according to the DK book 'weapon', which is about the evolution of weapons and armour throughout history, the native americans sometimes combined their war-axes with their peace pipes. i consider this ironic.

Have you ever seen the D20 setting from Atlas Games Northern Crown.It is out of print but it seems to be pretty close to what you are looking for.I picked up copies off of Ebay super cheap.

I have seen it, but I haven't found any reviews, and it seems to be as much about colonial folklore as native lore. I don't really know if that's what I want. What I want is to know if I should make any knew archetypes or if existing archetypes cover what I need, and as an aside I am also interested in magic item ideas.

My Pathfinder campaign setting takes place in an analogue of colonized North America, but with a larger indigenous population thanks to divine magic being able to help fight off disease. What would be useful for this is Native American lore. I have some good sources on this already, so I'm not asking for lore in general. I've got plenty of that. I'm asking for lore that could be used as inspiration for homebrewing adventure hooks, new races or monsters, magical artifacts, new spells, new class archetypes, and the like. If you guys have any Native American lore that could serve as inspiration for making homebrew materiel, I'd love to see it. I'm interested in stuff from any North American tribe. This includes Mexico, Central America, and the Carribean, and nations such as the Aztec and Maya.

The campaign world is medieval/renaissance with a heavy reliance on magic and steampunk, and streches from areas based off of Northern Canada down to analogues of Mesoamerica and the Carribean. Colonialism has happened, but thanks to skilled indigenous shamans wielding actual magic the death toll from disease was far lower, so the indigenous population is larger than it is in real life. I'm curious as to whether there are any new archetypes you guys think should be created for members of these indigenous culture to take, or whether existing archetypes cover pretty much anything.

In my homebrew, arcane magic has only been practical for about 50 years. Before that, casting methods and knowledge wasn't as advanced, making arcane spellcasting a lengthy and difficult process. As a result, Witches were the only common arcane spellcaster through most of history, and they were loathed and, when found, punished. In recent times this attitude has subsided and arcane magic, thanks to new discoveries in methodology, become both more powerful and more common, plunging the world into a sort of magical industrial age. Think Eberron, but with even more magic, and a much higher standard of living.

As for countries, I have Cromora, a Canada/New England combination with a rather dark past. Think Salem Witch Trials, except over a 250 year period and a death toll in the tens of thousands. Cromora has large American Indian, British Celt, and French populations, with a fair number of German, Norse, Russian, Italian, and Eastern European immigrants.

Then I have Minoka, which is an immigrant nation located in a nation like Hawaii, but with many, many, many more islands and a much larger population. Minoka has a large native Polynesian population, but it has a colonial past, having been Japanese at one point and still bearing a large Japanese population. It also has large immigrant populations from China, Korea, and Southeast Asia.

I have plans for the rest of North America, but they are still being hammered out.

That was the idea. The Wu Jen works very good as a Wizard archetype, and the Shugenja and Shaman just need a couple tweaks to work with Pathfinder. There is no need for any complicated, hard work when just a little bit does the trick just fine.

For this one, take the 3.5 Oriental Adventures Shaman and replace Turn or Rebuke Undead with Channel Energy at 3rd level, as the Pathfinder Cleric class feature. Treat the Shaman as a Cleric of her Shaman level minus two for this ability. Change the hit die to be 8 sided.

A taboo is something that a Wu Jen is not to do. The player chooses them (subject to GM approval), and they can be things like not eating meat, limits on how much they can own, not wearing a certain color, not bathing, and so on.

For this one, take the 3.5 Oriental Adventures Shugenja and add a Wizard elemental arcane school at first level. This must be the same school as the Shugenja's elemental focus. This school does not grant an additional spell slot or any additional spells known, and opposed schools do not require two spell slots to prepare, but this elemental school does grant school powers. All spells listed in an elemental school available to Shugenja's are added to the Shugenja spell list.

6. The GM ruled that the test is a test of heart, and that one's suitability for divinity isn't connected to one's character level or sheer power, because if it were every epic level character would become a deity.

I can't play that character ever again, but it was worth it. At least now I have a new Lawful Good deity my new character can worship.

You would have to apply for a Licence to purchase and own firearms, and be a member of a local shooting club (or be in rural areas), and would be required to keep it in an authorised gun safe.

Semi-auto rifles (and auto) are pretty much off the table though.

Pistols tend to be a bit more troublesome, but I'm not across the fine details of that, however I am fairly sure those collecting historical firearms are given a bit more flexibility (yes, historical collectors are recognised by law).

My great uncle still has a bunch of his SMLE's from WW2 after fighting the Japanese. He was kind enough to send me a couple of the bayonets for them (more like short swords) - however he sold off the captured Katanas, which made me a bit sad.

I don't have a problem licensing them or keeping them in a safe. My one question is whether, as a collector of historical firearms, I could fire them at a range.

It was actually less epic that it should have been. The GM didn't see "I'm going to take the Test of the Starstone" coming or know how to create such a test, so it was just a bunch of skill rolls. I did get to pick out my domains afterwards, though.

This whole issue is dead. The paladin never actually became an inquisitor, even though it was planned, and atoned with a priest over some of the more extreme actions. The guard captain eventually got her comeuppance when my paladin's rebellion, which expanded to include many individuals and resulted in several more dead government officials, got to the point that the King's Army had to calm things down, which ended with the King deciding that the guards had been getting away with way too much, and several, including the captain, being hanged. My paladin escaped punishment, as the King chose to let her actions go in light of what she was fighting. Then, in a separate scene, I lost the paladin character after I had the gall to take the Test of the Starstone after deciding that a new Lawful Good deity was needed to espouse beliefs she had that none of her deities shared.

First, the Bible judges truth. It is not we, Christians or otherwise, who judge the Bible.

Oh, really? If that's true, then why did humans have so much debate over which scriptures should be included in the Bible and which shouldn't? That sounds a lot like judging what the Bible should be to me.

Well, if you want to discuss what makes the Bible accurate or authoritative or related matters, I welcome the question. But that's not what this thread is about specifically.

The short answer is that there was precious little debate over which scriptures were canon and which were not. The three main councils that affirmed the Bible as we know it today all used those same scriptures for a considerable amount of time before the issue was basically sealed up at Nicea in 343 (?). If you have heard someone say that there was widespread disagreement over which scriptures were canon and which were fake or not inspired or whatnot, you should ignore that source. They are speaking without knowing the facts. There is disagreement over whether noncanonical documents can be inspired (I believe they can), or whether the apocryphal books are relevant (I believe they are, but are not canonical), but the idea that Christians determine what the Bible says instead of the other way around is wrong. On an individual basis someone might go looking for the Bible to say something they want it to say, but which books should be in the Bible and their actual content is not really contested.

There may have been a consensus by the 4th century, but that consensus took time to reach.

So, Shifty, I could legally buy me an old bolt action Lee-Enfield? That's the sort of thing I want. I'm not looking to get fully automatic weapons or anything, and I'm not looking to buy for self defense. I just want to own some old, obsolete rifles and revolvers, and maybe even some muzzle loaders, out of historical fascination with the devices.

Well, seeing as there still is no proof of "curing" gay people, or pedophiles, it seems to be the case that we can't radically change our sexuality. It might be possible to shift it a little, or to change the expression of it to some degree, but the basics are hardwired. Facets of our person that are not changable are typically heavily biological as opposed to environmentally determined. My guess is that it is a heavily selected trait that people HAVE a strong preference regarding sex, it is a necessity if you consider it an evolutionary system for producing male-female sex. As long as many enough have the typical opposite sex preference, what the others go for is less vital from an evolutionary perspective.

So, no, we do not choose our sexuality. I have never talked to anyone who could tell me about making such a decision.

Our religion, however, we do choose. Most religions even have ceremonies to signify that choice. The biological part of religion is likely the need to HAVE a religion. The specifics of it are obviously environmentally determined.

*dons her flame-retardant suit*

I think you posted this in the wrong thread, friend. Did you mean to put this in the Send this Letter to a Homophobic Parent thread?